A look at the Chicago political machine in the days before our story begins.

Campaign diarist Michael Lewis, on his transformation into a television reporter, and on an inspiring moment in American politics between two supposed political enemies from the 1960's.MIT Professor Henry Jenkins, on how candidates today campaign on cable and govern on the networks. (19 minutes)

Reporter Shirley Jahad investigates the politics of the Chicago hot dog on Navy Pier.

When it comes to political fighting, there's no more intimate a space than a marriage, where you have to get along. Where you have to figure out how to move on and get over disagreement.

Larry and Nancy head to Diyala Province north of Baghdad, and meet with a mayor and a member of the provincial council—like a state legislature—to see why is politics in Iraq utterly stalled.

Michael Lewis, on McCain and Ifshin.

Ira with Michael Lewis, author of Losers: The Road to Everyplace but the White House and many other books, who says that in the '96 Presidential Election all the candidates with new ideas, all the candidates capable of talking the way real people act in their real lives, were shunned by the media as "wacky." (10 minutes)

In this act, kids from the after-school literacy program "826" in Brooklyn, Los Angeles, Chicago and Ann Arbor read letters they wrote to Barack Obama. The letters are part of a book the kids published, called Thanks and Have Fun Running the Country.

Ira talks about a specter who haunts the floor of the United States Senate and won't go away, who keeps showing up on TV and making speeches. That ghostly figure? John Kerry.

Producer Zoe Chace hangs out with an unlikely Trump supporter in order to get to the bottom of his unusual motivation.

We give Danny Drennan, the writer behind the website Inquisitor Mediarama, a little assignment.

Chicago writer Beau O'Reilly writes about a group of close friends who formed an activist group in the seventies. They split apart because of one woman.

Host Ira Glass with an idealistic would-be politician in California. The puzzle of American politics is that our political system is filled with idealistic people, but few of our candidates for top office seem either idealistic or capable of inspiring passion.

Former political consultant Ron Susskind says that when he began in politics, he thought there was nothing lower than negative campaigning. But then in 1980 he learned that sometimes when your opponent attacks you, it can actually help you.

Some stunning parallels between the political strategies of the two leaders, by John Matisonn.

Ira talks with two of Trump’s “political enemies” about their post-election plans. (8 minutes)

A visit to a replica of the White House outside San Francisco, the home of Norman and Rosemary Eckersly.

Jyllian Gunther visits The Brooklyn Free School, where there are no courses, no tests and no homework, and where the kids decide everything about how the school is run, including discipline.

Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. already had one other man in his life who shared his name—his world famous father, the Jesse Jackson. But then right before his most recent primary race, an aide told him that he now had another Jesse Jackson to contend with.

We surveyed hundreds of people around the country, from every part of the political spectrum, about the ways in which politics are interfering with their friendships and families. Producer Lisa Pollak reports.

Stephanie Foo talks with two Army officers with very different political views about the week’s results.

Producer Bim Adewunmi on a decades-long political battle in Florida — between the incumbent state bird and the challenger that threatens to knock it off its perch.